


melt

by hallelujah99



Category: The Wilds (TV 2020)
Genre: Canon Divergence, F/F, Falling In Love, Fluff, Love, Post-Canon, Romance, Sappy, Sweet, canon except for the shark attack and the leah/nora issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:07:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28308000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hallelujah99/pseuds/hallelujah99
Summary: Toni and Shelby venture back to the lychee tree a few days later, and end up playing yet another ice breaker game before falling asleep.
Relationships: Shelby Goodkind/Toni Shalifoe
Comments: 21
Kudos: 439





	melt

**Author's Note:**

> Post-canon except there was no shark attack and there's no issues between Nora and Leah
> 
> Enjoy!

It had been a few days since the night Shelby and Toni had spent under the lycee tree together. Fatin had, of course, picked up on everything right away, and seen them kissing up on the dune afterwards. If anyone noticed them holding hands afterwards, no one mentioned anything. With Shelby’s blessing, Toni told Martha “There’s something going on between me and Shelby. Something really good.” Once, when they were collecting firewood, they had gotten wrapped up in each other and when Shelby pulled back from Toni’s lips, she saw Nora, staring in shock. She had told them not to worry, she was good at keeping secrets, and Shelby had nodded, although she was unsure she really even wanted this to keep being a secret.

She did, for a bit, though. Just have it be a special, sacred thing between the two of them. As much as possible, anyway. It’s crazy how the expansive island only populated by eight people managed to feel so crowded at times. She mentioned this to Toni, and of course, Toni was quick to come up with a plan. 

Toni approached the group as they gathered around the fire to feast on the night’s dinner of a single seagull and the final scraps of goat meat.

“Hey guys, Shelby and I, we’re gonna skip dinner and head back to get more lychee berries. We’ll be back in the morning.”

Fatin and Martha held back giggles, Nora stared at her hands, and Leah eyed them with some skepticism. “Is the tree really that far away? Why don’t you just go tomorrow?” 

Toni had prepared for this “Because this is the last of our food right here, and we wanna make sure we have a lot for all day tomorrow, who knows what else we’ll have to eat. We’ll sit this one out and just have the berries for dinner when we get there”

Leah continued to give them a skeptical look, and Rachel seemed to be jumping on the same train. “Okay, thanks guys, have fun!” Fatin quickly offered with a smooth smile, and with that, Toni and Shelby began walking away, hoping that Nora’s snickering was not noticed by everyone else. 

Once they were out of earshot, Leah said “So are we thinking Shelby is going to preach to Toni about not giving into gay temptations or....other way around” 

“Other way around.” Rachel said with confidence.

“I really try not to concern myself with other people’s personal lives, but even I got those vibes.” Dot chimed in. 

Fatin laughed “Well, it’s a win-win situation. We get to eat seagull and goat tonight and they get lychee berries and…-”  
“-Mussels!” Nora yelled, causing the group to roar with laughter. 

-

“What do you think they’re laughing about?” Shelby asked, taking Toni’s hand as they walked out of view of the camp. 

“No idea, babe” Toni replied, stroking Shelby’s hand with her thumb. 

“Babe?” Shelby asked. It was the first time she’d heard Toni say it. 

“Oh um, is that okay?” 

“Yeah. That’s good. Babe.” Shelby replied, leaning to kiss the top of Toni’s head. It tasted salty, of course, everything did these days. Shelby found herself wondering what Toni’s usual shampoo smelled like, wondering if Toni would ever get to wash her hair with it again, and if she did, would Shelby ever be there to smell it. 

Overwhelmed for a second at the thought of the outside world, the after-world, and the fear that this all might end soon, through painful death or salvation, Shelby stopped, pulling on Toni’s hand for a kiss. And like it so often went with Toni, once she’d started kissing her, Shelby did not want to stop for anything. 

Finally, Toni pulled away. “Babe, as much as I’m enjoying this, we gotta keep moving if we wanna get to the lychee tree before dark. And once we’re there, we can kiss as much as we want.” 

Shelby wondered if Toni was really intended to only kiss, but when she looked at her, she saw the devious glint in her eye, she knew Toni was on the same page as her, and tonight was not going to be just about kissing. 

_ 

A few hours later, spent and fully satisfied by the lychee berries and each other, Toni laid curled into Shelby’s side as Shelby stared at the sky as it grew darker. 

“Did you ever see so many stars in your life?” Shelby asked. 

“Well yeah, like in the middle of the night, there’s a lot more than this. Like just last night I woke up to pee, there were way more than this”

Shelby rolled her eyes. “You know what I mean. Back home.” 

“No, but I did see a little bit of the Northern Lights one time.”

“Oh my Lord, what was that like?” 

“Beautiful.” Toni replied, staring straight at Shelby’s face. It was clear what she meant.

“Can I ask you something?” Toni said, looking up at the sky. 

“Sure. We can play 20 Questions.”

“It’s always an icebreaker with you, huh?” 

“I think the ice has melted by now, if we’re being honest.” 

Toni nodded, hoping that she didn’t manage to freeze things over again. 

“Did you ever...like….before you came here...did you know?” Toni stumbled over her words, unsure how to protect Shelby from the fragility of her identity, despite the fact they were, in fact, cuddling naked after an incredibly intimate encounter.

“Um, I did and I didn’t. I did. I tried to fight it, you know, praying, and just, going through the motions with Andrew, I guess. It’s a lot easier to stay abstinent when you really don’t wanna touch the person, you know.” Shelby laughed. Abstinence had gone out the window after only the second time she kissed Toni. 

“But I also didn’t. I never let myself identify with...that word. I’d see a rainbow flag hanging somewhere and just like look away, try not think about it. I never allowed myself to dream about living like that.”

“And when you were in the whirlpool?” Toni asked, and Shelby buried her head into Toni’s shoulder in embarrassment. “Every single time, I’d be like ‘now, that is the LAST time I’m thinking about that.’” 

Toni laughed. “Thinking about what?” She didn’t expect Shelby to respond, but the girl was full of surprises. “You know. Girls fucking each other. Girls fucking me. Me fucking girls.” 

“And? Did it live up to your fantasies?” Shelby grabbed Toni’s face and kissed her. “Oh absolutely.” 

They kissed a little longer, then Shelby pulled back. “It’s my turn to ask you something now.”

“Fair enough, shoot.” 

Shelby contemplated for a bit. “When did you know you were?” Toni waited for a second to see if Shelby would say the word. She accepted it when she didn’t. 

“I mean I always felt kind of different.”   
“Mhm” Shelby agreed.

“Then I guess I was like 11, and there was this girl, she was actually in Martha’s dance troupe, Natalie. And I saw her one time at a competition and I just…” Toni laughed a little “I just like was obsessed. I didn’t exactly know why, I thought I just wanted to be her friend, but also kinda knew something else was up? And then at Martha’s twelfth birthday party, Natalie and I stayed up late and at one point I was like ‘oh shit, I wanna kiss this girl.’ And then over time, it just kind of became clearer and clearer to me that I liked girls and wanted nothing to do with guys.”

“Did you kiss her?” Shelby asked, suddenly struck with jealousy over events that happened years ago. Jealousy about Natalie, but a deeper sense too, that Toni’s realization didn’t appear to be completely shaded by guilt and fear and self-hatred. 

“No, I never kissed her. But it’s my turn to ask you something.” Toni replied. “So…” She thought about a few things, things she was too afraid to ask about. Anything to do with the future was too much to ask. The past was painful too, so the present it is.

“Who here do you think knows about us?” “Well obviously Nora and Martha, and Fatin knows, she actually knew before anyone.” 

“Wait what?”

“Yeah, like the morning after we got back, she was like ‘I know sexual tension when I see it’ and told me to go talk to you.” Toni laughed “I guess that makes sense.”

“As for the rest...I don’t know. I mean if they know, that’s fine I just...I don’t know. I’m taking my time...” She took a deep breath “Coming out.” 

Toni nodded and gave Shelby a little squeeze of encouragement. “What was it like for you? Coming out?”

“Um, well I told Martha first. We were having a sleepover and I guess I just...wanted to get it off my chest to her. And you know Martha, she just hugged me and said she was proud of me and stuff.” Shelby nodded. Martha was the best type of person to come out to. “Then when I was a freshman, I started talking to this other girl on my team, and people just kinda found out and I was like ‘yep, I’m gay.’ I bought some pride shit and posted a picture of myself wearing it and I figure people got the message.” 

Shelby was about to remind Toni it was her turn to ask a question when Toni continued, “I haven’t actually told my mom yet. I only see her occasionally, but the second to last time I saw her, I had a girlfriend at the time, and I was gonna tell her and it just...got stuck.” Toni paused and swallowed deeply. “When I was little, when I’d get taken away from my mom, I’d go to my grandma’s. Because she did such a good job raising her.” Toni laughed sarcastically. This was very clearly not something Toni was used to talking about. The fireball who will admit to throwing her own pee at someone had some things she kept buried. “And my grandma, she was...very, very religious.” 

Oh. 

“She didn’t like the fact I played basketball. She didn’t like the fact I refused to put on a dress. Didn’t like the fact I existed, that I was evidence of just how bad her daughter fucked up.” 

Shelby tightened her grip around Toni, pulling her in close. Toni’s existence was the most ethereal, wonderful, magical thing in the universe. 

Shelby knew it wasn’t appropriate to tell Toni just what she was feeling with words, not yet, so she kissed her and hoped the message was received as much as Toni was ready to accept.

“Umm…” Questions swirled in Toni’s head. She didn’t want to ask anything too probing or uncomfortable. She wanted to avoid asking questions she might not like the answer to. But she couldn’t help herself. 

“If we ever get off this island, what do you think will happen?”

Shelby was silent for a moment. “Do you mean with us?”

“If you can answer it that way.”

“I don’t know. It’s hard to answer because there was the me before all of this, living how I did, there’s me now, in all this, living how I do now, and I don’t know how those two things will merge, but…I can’t...I can’t fucking imagine how I could go on without you in my life.” 

“Me too.” Toni admitted. Shelby had worked her way into her heart, and she never wanted her to leave.

“What was your ex like?” Shelby asked. Toni stopped breathing for a second.

“I mean...I don’t wanna give you the wrong idea, but I don’t wanna badmouth her” Toni said carefully.

“Just be honest.” Shelby said, her heart in her throat.

“She’s a good person, really. Funny, outgoing. I was the one who really fucked up. I was too much for her to handle. I think...she saw the best of me, it was good. She saw the worst of me, it was done. And I can’t blame her for running away from me either.” Toni reflected on Regan for a second, and on Shelby. Shelby had seen Toni at an even lower low than Regan ever had, and she was still here, in her arms. That counted for something. Actually, that counted for a whole lot. But it felt too soon to put words to that.

Toni continued “We broke up over a year ago, though, and she started dating this person, Shane, a few months later and like…” Toni shrugged. “We’re not friends but we’re cool with each other, and I’m happy for her.” Toni could feel it in her heart that Regan would be happy for her too. She’d be happy that she had found someone who could handle her, tame her, accept her, and who had just as much fiery passion hidden deep down. 

“Tell me about Andrew.” Toni countered, involuntary flexing her arms. 

“Um he was really nice to me at first. And it’s nice when someone is nice to you, so I thought maybe that’s what love is supposed to feel like, or maybe I’d grow into it somehow. And then, I don’t know, our friend group just kinda formed with us as the couple and it all felt so like...like I couldn’t really escape it. And he did things for me, and I always tried to convince myself it wasn’t because he just wanted to sleep with me, but he really went out of his way to prove me wrong time and time again. And he was definitely cheating on me.”

“How do you feel about that?” Toni asked.

Shelby shrugged. “Disrespected, I guess. Lied to. Like, he really, truly did not respect me. And that hurts. But I’ve got a lot of other shit I care so much more about so it doesn’t really matter.”

“If you think about it, since you guys never broke up, you’re kinda cheating on him with me.” Toni joked.

“It doesn’t feel like cheating to me at all.” Shelby told her. It felt like the purest form of...love. But Shelby couldn’t say that, not yet.

“My turn then?” Shelby asked.

“Ask me anything.” Toni told her.

“I can’t think of anything. Tell me something I don’t know about you.”

Toni thought for a while. “I have a feeling you don’t know my ethnicity.”

Shelby was speechless. Toni was Native American, right? Or was that the wrong way to say that? Was she not? She didn’t wanna say the wrong thing so she said “I guess not.”

“So my grandparents moved to the US from New Zealand and they were indeginous people of New Zealand, so I’m Maori.” 

Shelby nodded. She could tell Toni had more she might wanna say about her background. “My grandpa died when my mom was little and my grandma never really told my mom much about it, never taught her the language or anything. And everything thinks I’m Native American or sometimes white and I just let them because it’s hard to explain. And I hate that I don’t know anything about it. But yeah, I’m Maori.”

“Thanks for sharing that with me, babe.” Shelby thinks about maybe one day taking Toni to New Zealand so she can visit her grandparents homeland and learn more about the culture. But it seems too soon to talk about anything like that. Not to mention, they have a pretty bad track record when it comes to plane trips. 

“Tell me something I don’t know about you” Toni passes back to Shelby. 

Shelby thinks about telling her about Becca, about the fact that her dad ran pray the gay away sessions for local kids in her own home. She thinks about telling her about the time she was little and fell off the jungle gym, or the first time she snuck a beer, alone in her room after she graduated middle school. She lands on something else, instead.

“So I used to have this like...recurring fantasy. Where I was like married to a man, and then this attractive single woman moved in next door and I slept with her, just one time. Just to get it out of my system.” Shelby knew that was some twisted mental gymnastics, that she’d allow herself to fantasize like that but not dream of simply being happy with a woman.

“Why married to a man?” Toni asked. “If it’s your own fantasy.” Shelby sighed. “Because I couldn’t allow myself...my dad always made me feel like people who are...gay... can only be alone and lonely. And I guess, I don’t know, I kinda wanna have kids, too.” Shelby reasoned.

Toni rolled her eyes a little, “I mean we can have kids.” 

“WHAT?” Shelby sat up in shock.

“I MEANT GAY PEOPLE, GAY PEOPLE…can have kids.” Toni said, wiping sweat off her brow and feeling terribly embarrassed about her mistake.

“I don’t suppose you and I would have the easiest time having kids any time soon anyway.” Shelby laughed.

“We’re way too young.” Toni agreed, and they both laughed. 

“Whose turn is it now?” Shelby asked.

“I don’t know. Do you have anything else you wanna know about me?” Toni asked. 

Everything, Shelby wanted to know everything about Toni. She wanted to know about her mom, her foster homes, her grandma’s house, her ex, her basketball career, her passions, what her school was like, what clothes she liked to wear, what she looked like dancing to her favorite song, what she liked to eat, what she wanted her future to look like. She wanted to know if Toni also was getting the feeling that this might be that thing that had eluded Shelby...love.

She kissed Toni passionately, and felt that she might just feel the answer in that kiss. 

“I wanna know everything about you, Toni Shalifoe.”

“Me too, Shelby Goodkind. Me too.” Toni whispered back against her lips.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you all enjoyed! This fandom is so wonderful! Comments really make me so incredibly happy if you'd leave one :) 
> 
> Love to all!


End file.
